Desperate Measures
by Neocolai
Summary: Elrond's sons discover their Dwarven "brothers-in-arms." Rivendell will never be the same.


**Just a light hearted one shot before I return to doling out chapters of heavy duty angst. ;)**

**I do not own The Hobbit, Tolkein's works or anything related.**

* * *

"Dwarves are such dull creatures," Elladan sighed, leaning against the wall with a mournful expression.

Elrohir grinned wildly, pointing out one of their visitors who was testing the effective properties of roasting a handful of 'green stuff.' "Are you mad, brother? What better entertainment could we ask for? Dwarves have such - "

A loud crash had them both ducking back into the shadows of the pillars they were hiding behind. Peeking out to see what the commotion was, they both burst into muffled giggles as the largest of the Dwarves moved from - or rather, rolled from - a pile of splintered furniture he had squashed.

"You tell me that _these_ are dull creatures?" Elrohir pointed out, edging further around the pillar to have a better view. "We have not seen such excitement since... well, since we began our reign of tyranny!"

"Yes," Elladan shrugged, "But they lack ingenuity. Food fights... drinking wars... they are exceedingly mundane. Their table manners are repulsive, even compared to ours, and that seems to be their speciality when it comes to disruptions." He sighed languidly. "It appears that we are doomed to begin this war ourselves, brother. Which should we start with? The fat one, or the one with the silly hat?"

"They all have such ludicrous beards," Elrohir pointed out, warming up to the challenge. "You would imagine they hired an orc to braid them. Perhaps we should offer them our assistance."

"A few lovely trilliums woven into our handiwork would make a charming touch," Elladan grinned. "After all, only beauty should grace the halls of Imladris."

"We _must_ start with the serious one," Elrohir said with an evil gleam in his eye. "I wonder if he can shout as loud as Ada?"

Elladan winced. "It takes weeks to goad father into a temper, Roh, and we do not have that much time."

Elrohir nodded seriously. "You are right; by all means we must begin _at once_. This promises to be our most difficult task yet, and we must not fail. Our reputation hangs in the balance."

"How exactly does one instigate the wrath of a Dwarf," Elladan wondered.

Before Elrohir could offer a suggestion they heard the swift clomping of running booted feet, and they barely had time to duck into hiding before two Dwarves raced down the hall and skidded onto the balcony.

"Whatever it was, we had nothing to do with it!" the dark haired one placated, glancing over his shoulder furtively as though prepared to flee at a moment's notice.

"We were minding our own business!" his blond companion agreed.

"_Fili and Kili! So help me, I will hand you over to the Orcs myself!"_

The dark one let out a muffled whimper and the two miscreants bolted. The Dwarves exchanged a glance and then resumed their previous activities as though such an occurences took place every day.

Thorin Oakenshield, the warrior of legends who barely offered a glower when Elladan commented that "His butterknife was very pretty but did it not look as though it needed a good sharpening?", had the most delicious expression of pure rage as he stormed past the twins. He was absolutely _livid_ as he demanded,

"Where are they?"

The Dwarf with the funny hat pointed nonchallantly down the hall that the mischief makers had fled down. Thorin made no comment, merely stormed in that direction with a simmering fury that would have caused a warg to wither away in terror.

Elladan and Elrohir gaped at the sight, exchanging a knowing glance and grinning in delight.

"We need to have a talk with those two."

* * *

Kili always complained that there was no reason for Uncle Thorin to be so angry with them, that it was always a harmless little prank they pulled and _not_ one of their finest. It was a pity no one shared their sense of humor.

Today's expendature had involved carefully sawing the legs from Thorin's designated chair by use of Kili's pocket knife, and balancing the mutilated piece of wood so that it would collapse the moment their uncle was seated. The hard part was evading the curious glances of the servants, as well as ensuring no one bumped into the chair and ruined their surprise. Thorin had good reason to suspect his nephews' anxious hovering, and he had cast them a glare which in no small order meant, _'Behave yourselves.'_

And they had! All throughout the day they had ignored the urge to step on the Elves' sweeping robes and trip up their graceful, dignified gait, or add a few unexpected ingredients to the serving dishes, or try to guess which elves were male and which were female. (All right, so they had spent an hour trying to figure that out, but they had done it _quietly_, which for them was an admirable feat.)

Of course, the moment Thorin spilled onto the floor in front of Lord Elrond and all present for that night's council, he had sworn eternal vengeance upon his nephews. Fili and Kili scarcely had time to enjoy the cold fury that swept over his features before they had been forced to run for their very lives.

Haylofts were uncomfortable, Kili decided, no matter whether they were intended for ponies or Elvish horses. He and Fili had fallen back on childhood strategies and burrowed into the dried grass to evade their uncle's wrath, and the scratchy substance was causing a terrible itch to Kili's poor nose.

"Do you think he may have forgotten us by now?" he whispered to Fili, trying desperately not to sneeze and give away their position.

"Uncle? Never. Best to remain in hiding until it's time to leave; at least then he will be too preoccupied to properly shout at us until we camp for the night. Then again, he may never speak to us until Durin's Day is past." Fili winced as he added, "I expect we will be guarding the ponies a great deal more in the next few days."

"What ponies?" Kili pointed out blandly. "I doubt Elrond will allow us to borrow any of his, especially now that we have proved Uncle Thorin to be a bumbling idiot in front of the entire council."

Fili nodded in agreement. "We will not live to see the night as it is." He sighed dramatically. "I suppose Uncle will have to accept Dain as his new heir."

Kili groaned and made a face. "Face it, brother; we are doomed."

"... Begging your pardon, Dwarves..."

Fili jumped at the voice behind them and Kili nearly tumbled out of the hayloft. He grabbed hold of the edge and blew his straw entangled hair out of his eyes, gaping in embarassement at the two Elves standing below. The shorter of the pair was hiding a smile behind his hand while the other was fighting to keep a straight face.

"We did not intend to startle you," was his blatant lie. "I am Elladan, and this is my brother Elrohir. We overheard your discussion, and we believe we have devised a solution to your problem."

"What problem? There _is_ no problem," Fili countered, glaring at Kili in annoyance that they had been overheard. He muttered under his breath, "Certainly nothing that two bumbling tree rats who should be minding their own business would be listening in on."

"Do you hear that, Elrohir? He thinks we are 'Bumbling Tree Rats!'" Elladan exclaimed in mock horror. "Such words of tyranny, disgracing our halls with the blatant honesty of a true Dwarf! I think something should be done about this, do you not aggree?"

"Indeed, brother," Elrohir responded in all seriousness, "Such an expressive insult cannot go beneath our notice."

"Now hold on a moment," Fili held his hands up peaceably, not wishing to incite any further wrath than was already coming to them from Thorin, "It was a mere jest, and not nearly half so creative as what terms you Elves use to describe us in your native language." Nor was it any match to what Fili could have said in Khuzdul, but he was not ambitious to the point of risking life and limb at this point.

"Oh, but it is," Elrohir assured him, leaving Fili with a sinking sense of impending disaster. "It is dreadfully creative. Ada would be simply horrified if he heard such a terrible insult."

"Alas, it will never do," Elladan bemoaned, drawing a hand dramatically across his brow. Kili blinked in confusion, the 'sworn vengeance' he had anticipated taking a decidedly odd turn. "Father has heard every Dwarven term in our vast history; such a paltry term would not even give him pause. We _must_ be more creative, Elrohir."

A gleam that Fili knew only boded ill news lit in Kili's eyes as he gathered, "I take it you are _deliberately_ inciting an Elf's rage?"

"Not just _any_ Elf," Elladan pointed out, "_The_ Elf. The most diabolical, stubborn - "

"Melodramatic - "

"Impossible - "

"Emotionally void forerunner of doom that has ever disgraced the halls of Imladris," they finished together.

"Elrond himself," Elladan added when Fili and Kili regarded him with blank expressions.

"Lord Elrond is your father?" Kili gasped in disbelief.

"You would believe the opposite seeing as to the amount of awe and respect they offer him," Fili muttered, once more neglecting to recall the finness of Elvish hearing.

"Actually, we consider our father in the highest aspects," Elrohir said in his own defense. He smirked cheekily and added, "In fact, I am certain we offer him the same regard as you do your future king - and, in that aspect, your own uncle if I have heard correctly. Am I not correct in this matter?"

Fili and Kili exchanged an admonished glance before Kili discretely vanished into the mountain of straw. Fili cleared his throat awkwardly, mentally chiding his brother for abandoning him in this hour of need.

"I take it you have informed the entire city of our whereabouts by this time?" he questioned in a surly tone.

"Quite the contrary!" Elrohir objected, taken aback as though offered the highest insult.

"We have merely come to request your assistance," Elladan finished for him.

Fili's brow furrowed in confusion and Kili emerged momentarily from hiding, his expression even more childlike due to the strands of hay entangled in his hair. "Our assistance?"

"Yes, indeed!" Elrohir nodded in excitement. "We have strived since your arrival to incite that dreary, abominably montonous uncle of yours into a hissing fit, and despite our most devious efforts neither of us has succeeded. The night is almost over and we will have failed our first task in over a century, and that in what would have been our grandest feat!"

"Ada must have warned Thorin ahead of time," Elladan said, leaning against one of the stable doors and folding his arms as he sulked. "He did look secretly peeved, do you not think, Roh?"

"Inner seething does not count, Elladan," Elrohir sighed. He ran a hand through his hair and looked to the dwarves pleadingly. "Please, you have managed to cause him to lose his temper so beautifully. We humbly ask your assistance in rankling our father - and your uncle, if you would be so inclined."

"Since when do we _'humbly' _make a request of a dwarf?" Elladan wrinkled his nose in disgust. "Is that not a little low even for us?"

"Desperate measures are called for, 'Dan," Elrohir waved him away. "Pay him no heed, he does not realize what he is saying. We will reward you for your troubles, of course, with anything you like! Gold? Jewels?"

"Our sister's hair combs?" Elladan offered. Elrohir shot him a glare and he shrugged his shoulders as though to question, 'What? Did we not offer _anything_?'

Fili struggled to keep a straight face, and he could hear Kili muffling his laughter at the ridiculousness of their situation. He had overheard heated whispers among the Elves whenever any subject regarding _The Twins_ was brought up, and Thorin had thrown his sword at Dwalin and snapped at him to 'Give it a proper cleaning' the moment the Dwarves had been left to themselves, but never in his life would Fili have anticipated any Elf _begging _them to assist them in pranking their own father - the ruler of Imladris no less!

"Oh, I don't know, Kili," he drawled, giving his brother a conspiratory wink. "I cannot say these Elves have anything we need."

Kili's jaw dropped and he shot him a horrified look as though questioning Fili's sanity for rejecting such a priceless offer. Fili tapped his brother's boot with his knuckles to signal for him to play along, and Kili hastily agreed,

"Indeed, I cannot see that... hair combs?... Would be of any use to us."

"I told you that would go over terribly!" Elrohir hissed at his twin.

"Is there nothing we can offer?" Elladan threw up his hands in defeat, for in spite of his complaints he, too, had been anticipating a ludicrous scene to top all the rest.

"Well..." Fili pretended to mull over the notion, "There is one thing..."

* * *

"Uncle! Thorin, you must come quickly!"

Thorin whirled on his heels at Kili's voice, prepared to deliver a harrowing lecture until he saw the look of stark terror on his nephew's face.

"What in Durin's name - "

"It's Fili, Uncle! He and one of Elrond's sons were quarrelling, and ... I fear he may kill him!"

"Who will kill whom?" Dwalin broke in, "The Elf or Fili?"

"Elrond's son!" Kili threw his hands out desperately. "I tried to stop him, but Fili would not heed me! He was brandishing a knife at Elladan's throat even as I ran to find you!"

Instantly Thorin was at the door, grabbing Kili's arm and pulling him into the hall. "Which way?"

* * *

"Ada! Ada! You must come!"

Elrond rubbed his brow in agitation, knowing the frantic pitch in Elrohir's voice only boded ill for all of Rivendell. "What have you done this time?"

"Father, Elladan intends to murder one of the Dwarven company!" Elrohir stated in alarm, sliding across the wooden floorboards in his hurry. "There was an argument and the Dwarf drew his sword... and the next thing I knew Elladan was strangling him! Kili and I attempted to pull him off, but... Ada, you must come at once!"

For a moment Elrond waited for the punch line, expecting his son to burst into childish laughter over his grand attempt to terrify his father. When no such response came he realized the gravity of Elrohir's words was no fallacy, and he swept to his feet with urgent haste.

"Lead me to him."

* * *

Elladan's hands were encircled like a vice around Fili's throat, the Dwarf gagging and turning an interesting shade of crimson even as he brandished a knife at the Elf's throat. Kili had raced ahead and was screaming for his brother to stop, while a panicked and furious Thorin was close at his heels. Several Elves and Gloin had already attempted to interfere, but from the manner they had fallen in every direction it appeared not even their combined efforts were enough to break up the fight.

Elrond hastened to cease the deadly tummolt, not heeding the warning cries of those scattered across the hall nor the way Kili expertly skidded to a halt several feet away. Thorin reached the circle a split second before him...

Only for his eyes to widen comically as his feet whipped out from under him, his arms scrabbling at empty air before he landed heroically on his rear and slid on his back until his foot struck Fili's cheek.

Moments later Elrond's elvish grace would not save him as his legs flipped out from under him, his robes puddling around his feet in a most indignified manner as he struck the floor. Instantly he gathered his remaining pride and scrambled upright, only to collapse once more as his boots flew out from under him.

As though to top off the evening ten dwarves followed their leader in quick succession, arms windmilling and legs spreading in painful splits as they blundered onto the oil slicked floor. Those who recognized the danger tried to skid to a halt as Kili had, only to be shoved into danger's path by those behind them. Bombur was the last, sliding a full ten feet before crashing into Bofur and sending the two sailing into a pillar. All the while Kili was bent over in stitches, Elrohir joining him as tears of laughter streaked down his face.

Thunderclouds such as had never threatened the halls of Imladris darkened Elrond's expression as his gaze turned accusingly to Fili and Elladan, who had remained in the only circle of woodwork that had not been sloshed with lamp oil. They helped one another to their feet and guaffed in mirth, Elladan nearly sending Fili to join the others strewn across the floor as he slapped the dwarf heartily on the shoulder.

Thorin's face was livid, his vehemence in the council room paltry in comparison to the disaster spelled out for his nephews as he shouted, "FILI AND KILI! SO HELP ME I WILL -"

He never finished his threat as Dori slid into him at that moment, dumping him on his face and ending the tirade with a disgusting mouthful of oil. Thorin spluttered and scrambled back from the floorboards, wiping his face with an equally soaked sleeve before tumbling in an ungangly heap the moment his hands slid out from beneath him.

"SO HELP ME, YOU WILL BOTH BE DEAD BY DURIN'S DAY!"

Clearly such promises were unheeded by the two miscreants, as their laughter merely increased tenfold at their uncle's shouts.

"If those Dwarves never set foot in Imladris again it will be too soon!" Elrond swore, his face mottled purple with indignity as he had not experienced in centuries.

Sensing their hour of reconning was at hand, Fili carefully skirted around the "safe zone" of the hallway and tapped Kili on the shoulder, urgently indicating the exit with a shift of his head.

"Now for the second part of their bargain," he determined, nodding at the whooping twins who had agreed to remain behind and take the brunt of Thorin and Elrond's wrath. "Let's get out of here before Uncle decides to forgoe those slime covered boots and chase us down in his stocking feet."

* * *

Elrond's expression was somber as he adressed the dwarves at their departure. If his inner contemplation was anywhere close to the murderous expression on Thorin's face, the two heirs of Durin would be lucky to survive to their hundredth summer.

"I suppose it is well enough we are leaving now," Fili muttered to his brother. "I would hate to discover Elrond's method of 'Elven Vengeance.'"

"Forget the Elves!" Kili hissed. "Uncle will be the one to kill us before this night is out!"

"According to my _sons_," Elrond quoted, one dubious eyebrow raised as he skeptically assessed the two trouble makers. "You have both earned honorable mention in future legends. Fili shall be forever remembered as 'He who is most liable to break his fool neck jumping off a cliff edge after his brother...'" He paused a moment and regarded Thorin with mingled pity and empathy, "And Kili has been termed 'He who is most liable to die by tripping in a rabbit hole.'"

Fili and Kili's jaw dropped, muffled snickers coming from the other dwarves around them. Fili could hold it back no longer and he burst out laughing, slapping Kili on the back and nearly bowling him over.

"A rabbit hole, eh? That will be the day, brother."

"At least I am not the one 'Most liable to die by breaking his fool neck,'" Kili responded tartly as soon as he recovered from the initial shock.

"Only from trying to save your sorry hide," Fili corrected. "I do believe I aggree with these Elves. Perhaps we should stay a few days more; it would be good for you."

"NO!" Thorin and, to the astonishment of all present, Elrond were swift to disagree.

"_Two_ of you in this city are enough," Elrond said coldly, casting a dark look at his sons who were sniggering in the partial concealment of a small coven. Adressing Thorin he made it clear the dwarves had overstayed their welcome. "May your journey prove safe, and may you find what you seek. And may you be granted the _peace_ which in all the centuries I have yet to earn."

Wild hoops of laughter indicated the twins were now rolling breathlessly in their mirth and Elrond shot one final glower in their direction before sweeping away. Fili elbowed his brother in the ribs and whispered, "Best Elvish circlet I ever earned."

"Do you think Elrond will miss it?" Kili questioned with a waver of doubt.

"I think you are the one who should be worried, little brother. After all, the twins did give you Lady Galadriel's."


End file.
